MPL's Blog

So, i don’t know if i’ve told you this, Dear Reader, but I’ve been doing the Mr. Mom thing over here for 3 week. I’m doing this because Diane is working in Colorado Springs Monday-Friday on a film. It’s always been her dream to both work in Colorado and work on films. This was her first opportunity, and passing on it was just not in the cards. So, i’m not at home, a la Michael Keaton.

So, what have I learned in these three weeks:

Being the only parent is both really hard and not that bad. It’s not that specific moments are super painful, but it’s just that it’s relentless. There’s no rest. There’s no snooze button in the morning if you go to bed late. There’s nobody there to take a turn. You just have to suck it up. I’ve gotten pretty good at it. It’s also not that bad in that Hunter goes to bed at 7 or 7:30 every night and i am home alone with free time. I can’t remember the last time i had this much free time to myself. Of course, i can’t leave the house, but still, it’s something.

I live in fear of middle-of-the-night wake ups. Seriously, i get incredibly nervous that he’ll wake up. Why? Because he can wake up at any time and with it he can destroy your next 24-36 hours. What started out as a nice night of sleep can turn into a night of only 3-4 hours of sleep creating a walking zombie the next day. This happens because i have lots of trouble getting back to sleep once i’m up for 20-30 minutes with a crying baby. The adrenaline is pumping and i’m wide awake. I live in fear every night. It’s crazy. I look at him sleeping in the monitor as just a ticking time bomb.

I’m pretty clean. I don’t do much around the house. I don’t use many dishes. I keep my clothes off the floor. I find that the house looks pretty good. Hmm, who knew?

Television is a social habit for me now. I love watching shows with Diane. We chat about the characters, the situations, who we like, hate, and how we want the series to go. I have found that i get very little satisfaction watching shows by myself. In fact, in the three weeks i’ve been doing this, i’ve not turned the TV. Now, reading is a different story. I’ve read more in these three week than i did the entire year previously.

Being the primary person in your kid’s eyes is awesome. I quickly became elevated from just “that guy next to mom” to “a guy i need to pay attention to.” When he sees me now his face lights up. When he crawls, he looks for me before he goes any further. And when he’s scared, he crawls into my arms. It’s fantastic.

I have no social life. I get home from Kapost and immediately go to work. I do a solid food round (20 min), a bath (20 min), a bottle feeding (20 min), play time (20 min). After that, it’s time for bed. He goes down and then my night begins. In that time i need to answer about a million emails, do some work, and get dinner (with the time bomb ticking the entire time). Did you hear “hang out with my buddies” anywhere in there? So, in short, this is my way of saying: see you in a month or two when this experiment is over.